Stargate: Tin Men
by JovianJeff
Summary: These are the adventures of robotic duplicates of SG-1 from "Tin Man" in the same Stargate Wives universe I started, which means there are also duplicates of Sara, Drey'auc and Sha're.
1. Chapter 1

Title: Stargate: Stargate Tin Men

Author: Jeff

Category: AU

Content Level: Age 13

Content Warnings: None

Pairings: Jack/Sara, Daniel/Sha're, Teal'c/Drey'auc

Season: 3

Spoilers: Tin Man, Double Jeopardy

Summary: These are the adventures of robotic duplicates of SG-1 from "Tin Man" in the same Stargate Wives universe I started, which means there are duplicates of Sara, Drey'auc and eventually Sha're.

Status: WIP

Disclaimer: Stargate SG-1 and its characters are the property of Stargate (II) Productions, Showtime/Viacom, MGM/UA, Double Secret Productions, and Gekko Productions. This story is for entertainment purposes only and no money exchanged hands. No copyright infringement is intended. The original characters, situations, and story are the property of the author. This story may not be posted elsewhere without the consent of the author. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

Update: Revised name to Tin Men from SG-1 2.0 because it occurred to me that it could be confused as a crossover with Jake 2.0 and it has nothing to do with that show.

Author's note: In "Double Jeopardy" Harlan had said that the robot duplicates from "Tin Man" had started to go out on missions, and in my Stargate Wives series I had taken this a step further by having Sara and Drey'auc at the end of "Tin Man". In this series I hope to write about their adventures and how, like in Wives, one change from canon could make a difference on how a spins from there. For instance I do plan on further adventures post "Double Jeopardy" if this goes on long enough.

I am also going with the continuity recont that since Harlan had mentioned he was over 11,000 years old yet the Ancients hadn't returned till 10,000 years ago and the Goa'uld didn't spread humans about the Galaxy until 5,000 years ago, these might have been a group of Alterans (Ancients) who stayed behind in the Milky Way or came back from the Pegasus galaxy early.

This will likely mean that a city ship is sitting on the surface of Harlan's world and with the notion that his facility is located under it.

Now for the first chapter of Stargate: Tin Men...


	2. Screwloose

Screwloose

"Permission to send for help," Robby's voice boomed in the gate room causing Walter and Dan to exchange a look. "Restate, request General Hammond's permission to send for help to retrieve SG-6."

Sergeant Dan Silar looked to Chief Master Sergeant Walter Harriman who returned the gaze, "Okay. I'll go get the General," Dan finally said breaking the shared look.

"I think he heard already," Laara Davis spoke up as General Hammond made his way down to the control room and up to the mike.

"What have you got in mind, Robby?" every since the big blue bot helped him rescue SG-1 earlier this year, he's treated it as someone under his own command, though no-one thought he judged the alien-human built robot more than the personnel born on Earth.

"I wish to contact Colonel O'Neill on P3X-989 and inform him of the situation. This posses no danger to Earth or compromises this command or the order to lock out of P3X-118," Robby intoned and by now others were arriving including Robby's builder Airman Will Robinson.

"I told you that thing would slip a cog one day," Jack O'Neill remarked as he entered the control room.

"Colonel," Hammond spared only the single word with a tone that spoke volumes, and not bothering to stop to see if his unspoken oration was followed, turned back to the mike and Robby, "They probably buried their gate son. They won't get your message." Presuming Robby intended to use the gate to send of course, which given what the bot had done in the past was assuming quite a bit.

Robby shifted only a bit but Jack O'Neill felt like he was being looked at even before the big blue robot addressed him, "Colonel O'Neill, would you wish to stop gate travel if you were in that Colonel O'Neill's place?"

"No he would not," Teal'c's deep baritone floated in past Jack's shoulder as the Jaffa and his wife entered the control room, Sara on their footsteps.

"Then I presume the other Colonel O'Neill has not either. Sending a message would not compromise this command to test this. May I proceed?"

Major General George Hammond did not like leaving anyone behind if he could help it. The fact they had never recovered the body of Airman Hayward still bothered him and that was from the beginning of all this, when Airmen Rachael Hayward was abducted and later executed by Apophis.

"You have a go son," he said a moment later hearing a 'General' as Jack's protest. One he didn't waste time addressing, "Colonel. I know you don't trust the other you. I know you don't trust Robby either, but I do and I also know Washington will not sanction any rescue mission or contact with the aliens from P3X-118. I know you don't want to leave them behind, nor do I and until I hear word from someone I trust, I won't write them off. If that means I use resources outside of this command, I will do that. I think SG-1 of all people would understand that."

Jack had to concede that point. He didn't trust the robots, never would. They're machines only to him, but he recalled how the General went around the orders not to send a rescue force after SG-1 when they were in the hands of Hathor. Orders that didn't say he couldn't go just that he couldn't send anyone under his command to go.

Where he traveled to Chulak to look up Teal'c and Drey'auc who had left the SGC to go search for the missing SG-1. This is where Robby came in as he had followed the Jaffa couple out to search for SG-1. Then help support the rescue operation when it did organize itself with Master Bra'tac and the Jaffa men and women of Chulak who followed Teal'c and Drey'auc.

No, he wasn't going to leave SG-6 behind if he didn't have to and he really hoped that the other Jack was like his.

Jack was bored.

That was how he justified convincing the others enough time had passed and Earth wasn't going to send through a bomb to P3X-989, Altair, Harlan's world...home.

Carter and Daniel had everything to study here, languages for Danny boy, the technology for Sam, which left the two single ...people, and Jack didn't like to think of himself as the machine he is, doing something. The married couples of himself and Sara, Teal'c and Drey'auc 'contented' themselves with exploring and helping to not just maintain their home but repairing it.

"Coat a paint, touch up," Jack had remarked more than once when it appeared their new home would never be properly repaired. Still it wasn't enough and he found he yearned for part of the life he had before Harlan stole it from him. Sure the other him, but this was the Jack who had to live with the consequence of not going back to Earth.

He was grateful that they allowed Sara and Drey'auc to be ...duplicated, he was surprised the girls thought of it on their own. He hopes his other self, note he wouldn't think of the other Jack as the 'real' one, realizes what kind of woman he has for himself. Sara, his Sara, has certainly made this exile more than bearable.

Yet he missed going out there, making a difference, and most of all he still wanted to protect Earth. Even if he could never go back to it.

So he convinced the others to get the gate ready to go again. Carter to try and find away for them to last longer out there and what took most of the time in the beginning, convincing Harlan they were not going to go off and leave him alone again.

"Incoming wormhole," the voice of the world around them spoke and Jack saw the chevrons light up one by one. Despite the distances people were from the gate area it didn't take long on robotic legs for everyone to gather. Sara handing Jack a gun, both Jaffa with their staff weapons ready, Daniel and Sam with Zats.

What human ears would have heard was merely a series of beeps and whistles, however what they heard was a high speed message and it was once Jack realized what was happening that he frowned.

"I hate that," he remarked as it reminded him of his machine nature and then thought about everything he just 'heard', which proceeded the whoop and cheers from Daniel as Robby's message contained an update, one that let him know Sha're had been rescued and is free of Amonet.

Jack certainly wasn't going to focus on the how they were just updated, not when he could celebrate with his friend. Who was already being embraced by Sara and Drey'auc with Harlan not knowing Sha're but shouting his familiar, "Com'traya!"

Jack knew his friend and could see the idea forming in his mind even before he lets go of Sam and spins to look alternately at Jack and Harlan. "This means I could have Sha're with me...I mean, if she's open to this," Daniel's face falls a bit as he thinks about it, and all Jack could think to say as he laid a hand on his friend's shoulder, "Daniel...do you really think they'd let her come here? Do you want to condemn her, the Sha're who stays to never be able to go back to her family, her world?"

It's a notion that silences the others, Sara in particular stares at Jack who returns the look, "Don't think I haven't seen it in your eyes. Sometimes you miss home and you wish you were the one that's there. But hey," Jack turns to everyone, "Let's not think about that. We're alive, we're together, and my double has finally gotten some sense and asked his Sara to marry him."

Smiles went around, tentative as they were, with Daniel speaking up again, "I want to go. I mean after SG-6. They're friends," turning towards Jack to cut him off, "Yes, of the other Daniel, but I have memories of spending time with them on PX3808. I know them Jack. Richard, Linda, Brendan, Peter, they're more than just names to fill a MIA list."

"Sir we have capabilities other SG teams don't have. We're stronger, faster, sir we could really make a difference, not just with getting SG-6 back, but in the fight with the Goa'uld," Sam pressed hoping to convince Jack.

"I would find it be more agreeable than just staying here, O'Neill," Teal'c chimed in and then looked at Harlan, "We would return and not leave you alone Harlan."

Sara took the seemingly old man's hand, "This will always be home to us."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa...you are -not- going with us," Jack began causing Daniel and Sam to share a look, knowing the decision was made just details to work out now.

"Why not? Yes, I'm a civilian, no military training, but I am stronger and faster than your average bear," Sara replied baffling most but Jack and Sam, seeing so she added, "Yogi Bear...it's a cartoon character. That's one of his sayings..."

"Never mind," Jack cut off her attempt to explain to two Jaffa and one Daniel who was either traveling the world with parents on digs, or shuffling from one foster home to the next. Television was likely not one of the things he experienced growing up.

"Look, I'm not saying I'm ready to shoot it out like Rambo, I'm just saying if more is better, why not me?"

Jack stood there and thought, Sara knowing that look didn't say anything but continued to look into his eyes.

"You're not ready for this. Not yet," she decided before he did, "I'll stay here with Harlan. Give you a reason to make it back and not throw those steel buns of yours away on some useless taking-too-many-chances maneuver."

Teal'c and Drey'auc shared a single look, and Teal'c nodded, with Drey'auc speaking up, "I will be going."

"And I think I may have an advantage for us..." Daniel said moving towards the computer, "The update mentioned the gate builders and their language...one of the four at the meaning of life. The language identified now as Asgard...but its the one identified as Ancients that is like some of the language I was studying here about those on the surface before they came down to this factory."

Daniel led them towards the upper levels of the complex, Harlan growing more nervous the farther up they went. Sara took his hand and realized it might be good for someone to stay with him after all.

"From what I've translated, this is called a Gate ship," Daniel shows them a roughly cylindrical tube shaped craft, the forward part has a window, the rear a ramp leading into it. "Ancients use it to travel between the gates..." he turned towards Teal'c, "Like the cha'tak you, the other you, flew through the gate to save the other SG-1 from Hathor."

"Yes! Glad that witch is dead," Jack pumped his fist, and felt Sara's hand in his giving it a squeeze.

Daniel decided to press on after the interruption, "Anyway, this could get us around unseen...like the Re'tu and Nirrti if you will recall your updates."

"We might wish to contact the Re'tu, as we do not have symbiotes to worry about," Teal'c suggested with Drey'auc adding, "We will still need to see them husband."

Now Teal'c looked at Harlan, "Can you not make it so we see them as did 'Charlie'?"

Sam started to get excited, "Yes, yes. We could adjust the processors of our eyes to perceive things out of phase from our reality..." she turned her bright eyes to Harlan who sheepishly looked at her, and weakly said, "Com'traya?"

"Carter!" Jack protested, "For crying out loud, can't you not remind us we're machines please."

"Sorry sir."

"So Danny boy any more of these things?" Jack said now in the pilot seat hours later. It took only seconds to realize that more systems responded to him more than anyone else, even Harlan. 'It is why we had not used one since Hubald' he had said and was not sure at all why Jack out of all of them had the ship respond to him.

"Quite a few in 'the City'," Daniel had used his fingers to gesture quotes, "Which I imagine is on the surface. I'm still working on translating what I've found. The other me gave me a huge lead on it...him and my ...mother who is still alive." That one rocked him too, and more than anything he wanted to go to Earth and see both of them, but knew that was also impossible. They belong to the life the other, the real, Daniel Jackson. No, not real, the biological Daniel Jackson. "I'm just as real as the other one," he muttered to himself.

"So we're going to trust this 11,000 year old ship to fly?" Jack paused before taking hold of the handles before him.

Daniel gestured, "Just like Harland, or the Stargates for that matter. Take it away Jack. We won't know until we try."

Once they figured out Jack had to think about it, the Gate ship rose and started to move under his guidance. Eventually the arrived at the space where the gate was set up, Harlan and Sara waiting for them. "Let's try this internal DHD...Carter?"

"Sir, we should cloak too," Sam reminded him before pressing in the address to P3X-118. After the horizon formed they went through with barely a ripple to emerge seconds later out the other side to what seemed like a literal living city.

"Organic technology...this makes sense given the update," Sam was clearly excited as Jack flew them around this 'city' of spires and towers that looked as if they were sheathed in carapaces instead of stone, wood, metal or even some alloy.

"Where do we even begin to look?" Jack asked as they continued to fly around the living city.

"Thought of that sir. Daniel seems to think that this..." and she types several buttons, "...will bring up an on board life signs detector." Suddenly a Heads Up Display shimmers into existence in front of Jack and Sam just in front of the widow. "Like that, sir."

"Just how did you become so fluent in Ancient in so short a time?" Jack asked exasperated.

"Its that part of us that you don't like to be reminded," Daniel hedged, his tone cautious, "And I have been studying this for the last two years. I just didn't know -what- I was studying until the update."

"Oh. Right. I knew that...Carter?"

"Yes sir, filtering out other life forms save humans...there!" A window opened up on their HUD and whose view zoomed in even as Sam pointed needlessly to where four dots blinked, "That should either be SG-6 or four other humans."

There turned out to be a huge mound or mountain if they were back on Earth. "That has got to be the second biggest ant hill I have every seen," Jack muttered prompting everyone to look at him puzzled, "Get Smart...another TV show. He'd never say this or that was the biggest whatever just the second biggest."

"Its okay sir," Sam said diplomatically, then frowned as she looked out the window, "Doesn't that entrance look like..."

"The entrance to Cheyenne Mountain..." Daniel completed as he stood up out of his seat and moved forward for a better look.

"A mock up? But why? Their attempt failed," Sam was clearly baffled, as were Daniel, and Drey'auc.

"Perhaps they ascribed to the Tau'ri axiom of if you first you fail, continue to do so until you cannot," Teal'c volunteered obviously proud he could answer.

"Its try, try again, T," Jack wasn't going to correct more than that right now. To which Teal'c just raised an eyebrow and Drey'auc succeeded in not laughing to ruin the image of Jaffa stoicism.

"If it is like Cheyenne Mountain, a complete mock up, we don't have to go through the front door, sir. From the update I, the other Sam, got in and out without them knowing about it from one of the access tunnels to the surface."

"Sounds like a plan. Okay campers, I'm setting us down, we'll go in by night fall."

Going in at night fall turned out to be a bit odder than one Colonel Jack O'Neill had hoped for. "I feel like I should turn on a light or something," he groused as they made their way across the terrain that really did appear like an ant hill 'by Godzilla' as Jack had told them and was ready to explain to the Jaffa when Teal'c informed him that Rya'c had introduced those films to them.

"Well its that thing you don't want to be reminded of," Daniel reminded Jack again who fell silent as they made their way to where obviously fake brush and bushes surrounded a hatch that back on Earth on the real Cheyenne mountain would lead down into the base.

"Oooo...squishy," Jack snarked after a particular messy first encounter with the aliens they have yet learned the name of their species. He was shaking the remains of one off his hand, "Didn't realize they were so... soft."

"They are not O'Neill, we are just much stronger than..."

"Don't say it!" Jack cut Teal'c off though quietly, "Just don't T. I don't want to hear it."

Drey'auc and Teal'c exchange another look, Teal'c raising his eyebrow in a gesture that spoke volumes.

"Sir, we probably should get going," Sam reminded them by way of reminding Jack, "You have the scanner."

Arriving at a chamber that precisely like the one their update described where the first attempt at invasion had ended up storing duplicates.

"I wonder how many times this is going to happen?" Daniel asked as Jack found a rolling stairway and moved it over to hanging Major Richard Thacher.

"What's that Daniel?" Jack asked as he was ready to pull apart the vest holding Thacher up.

"More duplicates of us. I mean this makes what for you alone," a part of Daniel knew the answer instantly, but he put it aside, right now he just wanted to talk in a fashion that had no connection to his new nature, "Five for you, four for me, three for the rest for everyone else."

"Five for me," Jack sounded incredulous hesitating again before ripping the vest apart, "Don't you mean just four for me?"

"Perhaps haste may be advised O'Neill," Teal'c suggested from below. He intended to catch Thacher IF Jack ever frees him from the organic restraints.

"Ease up T, I just want to get this straight. Once we rip one out, an alarm will sound. So Daniel...five?"

"Well yes. Crystal generated Jack, ourselves from Harlan and if you count the alternate reality, both Colonel and General O'Neill there," which was a subject he didn't want to linger on. It had made Jack, Sara and Sam very uncomfortable, especially the second alternate reality where that Sam was married to that Jack.

"...and you and I were duplicated by these aliens," Daniel finished up not wishing to linger on that awkward notion.

"Oh. Right. I knew that," and without another word he freed Thacher who dropped into Teal'c's arms. Then it was a race as the alarm sounded. Daniel would push the stairs, Jack would free a member of SG-6, with Teal'c, Sam and Drey'auc catching them.

"We don't have time for them to collect their wits, fireman carries, I'll take point," it was something Jack ignored openly, but wasn't going to ignore the advantage their bodies gave them. Each of them could easily carry each member of SG-6.

Jack had not only the most covert operation experience but now could recall all of it instantly. He could make use of every trick in the book, he inwardly grimaced that he now knew the book in high definition photographic memory. With a setting on single shot, or burst, he took out intervening aliens between him and the exit they came in at.

Again he ignored how they just effortlessly dragged the members of SG-6 up the shaft and then were carried over the shoulders again to get to the Gateship. One by one they were laid down in the back as Jack took up the pilot seat once more.

"Only a few causalities, all of them theirs," Jack remarked as the ship rose invisibly into the air, "Just the sort of mission I like."

"So how do we get them back to Earth, sir?" Sam asked settling herself into the co-pilot's chair, "Direct is out, and our codes don't work anymore."

"Not sure Moon base Alpha is going to welcome us warmly," Daniel tossed in to contribute to the conversation.

"How about the Tok'ra," Teal'c suggested, "Robby did give us the last gate address for them."

"My dad," Sam closed her eyes, "Her dad...could get them back."

"Sam, he's your father too," Daniel pressed with Sam looking as if she wanted to shed tears but wouldn't.

"No, Daniel. I won't be anything more to him than a copy, a machine," she bitterly remarked eyes wet but with tears unshed.

"It's a start. Carter, dial it up," Jack ordered quietly, he knew how he, the other him, regarded them as nothing but machines. He regarded them as nothing but machines in a few dark moments. Sara had reminded him he was just as real as the other Jack and their feelings just as important.

"...and so Robby told us about SG-6 and we went there and rescued them," Sam had told the Tok'ra council while SG-6 was being examined.

"So...you're really not my daughter?" Jacob asked coming from around the table, the words searing Sam in a way worse than she imagined. She knew what she was, and even prepared herself for this, but hearing the words from her father's mouth hurt even more.

"I'm...I'm just a copy," She barely was able to get out, with Jack going rigid. He could see this playing out in his mind, and had similar feelings himself concerning them, but he felt like Jack O'Neill, thought like him, to this Jack, he had to consider himself, Jack O'Neill.

Jacob took a moment to look into Sam's eyes and saw the daughter that hadn't mended fences with, whose hurt hadn't been reconciled, who never knew he was dying, and yet his approval of her still mattered.

"Hey...you may not be the daughter of my flesh," he took this Sam into his arms, "but you're still the daughter of my heart." Perhaps Selmak had an influence on him, or perhaps what he'd seen, almost dying again on Ne'tu had opened his eyes to a universe of possibilities, whatever the reason, he decided he was going to accept this Sam as his daughter.

"Now I've got too girls to be proud of," he remarked pulling away only so far as an arm length, his hands on her shoulders, "I understand you're not welcomed back on Earth, but I want you to know, you're always welcome here with me."

"We will get SG-6 home Samantha," someone Sam heard was named Martouf said walking up to her. He had a look like he knew her, which means the other Sam and something else in the eye made her want to take a step back, "Thank you." She was glad that the words 'That's Captain Carter' didn't slip from her lips. He seemed kind enough, but this Sam was glad she didn't have anything like a symbiote in her.

It was purely her new nature that kept her from shuddering at the thought of it.

"Okay campers, our job is done. Time to ride into the sunset," Jack said gathering up his team, and knowing that Teal'c had a comment even before the big Jaffa spoke.

"We would have to wait until tomorrow to do that O'Neill."

They hadn't shown the Tok'ra the Gateship, having left it and Drey'auc at another gate to wait for them. This Jack had fewer reasons to trust them, even more so after the Update informed them of what one of their number did to the other Sam.

"Dial home, Sam," Jack said as everyone settled into place. One ripple later they were home and with a new face to greet them. A smile grew and widened on Jack's face as he heard the surprise and joy in his friend's voice, "Sha're!"

He barely had the Gateship down when Daniel ran out of the back and into the arms of the woman he didn't think he'd get to see ever again. Even if she really had been rescued.

Sara swayed up to Jack, hands went into hands as they, like Teal'c and Drey'auc beside them, and also holding hands as they like their original counterparts had adapted the Tau'ri gesture. Sam looked on feeling both left out and at the same time fortunate she didn't lose a father, she gained one also could be happy for Daniel, her Daniel, now that he has his Sha're back with him.

Jack considered the tableau before him and what they had just done. It felt good to go out on a mission, to accomplish something. They'd have to do this again someday. The Goa'uld are still out there and then there are these duplicating aliens who still seemed set on invading Earth.

Much to do and in away, now the universe had twice the SG-1 to do it with.


	3. Perfect Pretense

Perfect Pretense

Author's note: Just a short piece about Tin man Sam that came to me after writing Pretenses and Prospects.

Perfect recall. It helps when my perfect hearing picks up on how the others are perfectly happy with their spouses. Jack and Sara, Daniel and Sha're, Teal'c and Drey'auc. I'm the only one alone from Earth and even if Harlan was my type, he hasn't been interested in anyone in thousands of years.

They're concern, I know that. Each of them think of me alone now that Sha're is among us. Once Sara and Drey'auc had come it was Daniel and I, and he just couldn't think of anyone else but Sha're. I suppose he was the one who lead me to this. I think I asked him how does he do it. How does he cope not knowing about Sha're?

He told me about perfect recall. Our new minds can think back to precise moments in our memories and 'read' them with clarity our original selves could never experience. We can remember sight, sound, touch, even smell. When he was lonely he would think back to the year he spent on Abydos, with his wife and new family. He would think of Sha're the way the light caught her hair, the sound of her laughter and touch of her skin next to his.

I probably shouldn't be thinking back to what he said. Perfect recall, not always a blessing.

So I sit here, pretending that perfect recall is my salvation when really it's my shield. I didn't have a good love life, no one I had such good times I would want to think back to. Jonas was domineering, and most of the others felt threatened by my intelligence.

Except Narim.

I think back to him and wonder if he's okay. If he's happy out there and some days I wonder if he still thinks of me.

Perfect recall. The emotion recorder he gave me let me experience what he felt each time we were together. How wonderful he felt, how complete I made him feel, how his heart seem to beat faster...I don't have it any more. That was left behind with the rest of my life when I was made.

Perfect recall, its one way I kept Narim with me. Over and over again when the laughter of the couples is too much I retreat here, pretending on thinking about the next great breakthrough and really I replay those memories. I don't need to ask my other self, my real self, for the recorder, I remember each use perfectly.

Perfect recall, its how I survive being alone among my new happy family.


	4. R2Re'tu

R2Re'tu

"Com'traya!" Harlan shouted for glee as the iris successfully activated. Samantha certainly knew how it was made and getting the materials was just a matter of another mission. Putting it in place merely took time and effort, something each of them had a lot of when not looking after the facility they now called home.

"Tok'ra identification," the computer announced from the rusty appearing console. Samantha typed the new command for the iris to open and sent the clear signal. Moments later a Tok'ra delegation walked through and as it turned out not just Tok'ra either.

"Re'tu?" Sam asked then noticed someone else who wasn't Tok'ra either, and a smile spread across her lips, "Narim...what are you doing here?" Her smile grew even wider when she recognized one of the Tok'ra, "Dad!"

"Hey kiddo," Jacob opened his arms to hug the woman he knew was a copy of his daughter, yet acted just like her in so many ways he couldn't help but think of as his daughter. His second Sam in away, like having twins, except far more literal.

"Let me look at you," now that he held her out at arms length Selmak noticed what Jacob did almost as fast as Sam did.

"What?" she asked knowing he was seeing something only parents saw and was touched inside by it.

"That it is like having twins," he heard her sigh and saw that turning of the head of his, that way of his that said loudly that she wasn't getting what he really was saying, and Selmak pointed that out helping him to say what he should say out loud, "I mean not the way you two look, don't take your old man so literal. I mean you both look alike true, but you have your own little quirks that if you were side by side right now, I think I would still tell you apart."

Sam didn't think he could have said anything more to move her so. Grateful that he brought her back into his arms to hug her as unexpected tears slid down her face.

"Sadness, yet I think happiness too," all but Narim heard the Re'tu comment.

"Enough of that, Kalakek, we should let them have their moment without an audience don't you think," Ma'chello noted and walked up to where the rest of the SG-1 and their wives stood waiting with Harlan. He still had a tendency to totter as if he were still an old man but that was happening less and less now.

Sha're noticed Linea hesitantly walk up to her, "I hope we're still friends, even if I'm something different now. I still have all the memories of when we first met, this..." and she gestured around the chamber, "...didn't happen until long after that. We had been to the Re'tu and back again by the time I came to be with my Dan'yel who could not be with me."

Linea smiled brightly and then took the other Sha're into her arms to hold, amazed at how warm her other friend felt. _"Indeed not like a robot at all,"_ Garu internally commented on what they both felt.

"So we ready to do this thing?" Jack asked remembering precisely why the Tok'ra, Tollan and Re'tu were here, "Narim you got your thingie on to see and hear old Kalakek here?"

"Yes, Jack we're ready...if Harlan is ready?" Ma'chello answered, Narim just went 'oh' and touched a device on the side of his arm, his perceptions shifting to perceive the Re'tu. Now he could see and hear him for a time.

"So I know that you've gotten yourselves...adjusted to see Kalakek," Narim did recall Jack didn't like to be reminded he was a machine, "How are the Tok'ra perceiving him?"

Ma'chello inclined his head and gestured with his hand towards Linea who felt comfortable enough with this Sha're to stand there hand in hand with her friend, her other friend.

"I noticed the genetic engineering that the Re'tu did for Charlie and found a way to make a change in our bodies for our symbiotes to manage it. We no longer need Ma'chello's eye and ear buds to perceive them. Our eyes tend to flash more often so we won't discard his devices, but this way feels more...natural," and as if on cue her eyes flashed with an inner light.

"Now to truly understand our friends the Re'tu and come up with a proper masking system so they can go among Goa'ulds without setting them off, we are here to study their transphasic state. Kalakek here is going to let us make a copy of him to help with that," the sole Re'tu took the equivalent of a bow, a single appendage coming to his chest as a human might with their hand.

Jack kept his doubts on the selection of the volunteer internally, which is not to say he kept them to himself as Samantha had rigged away for them to 'talk' to one another. 'Like telepathy' he had quipped when suggested it.

_"Still gotta wonder why they are testing this on an ex-terrorist,"_ Jack thought, he pushed aside the notion of transmitting, to the others, _"If this works, shouldn't someone be afraid he might go off and start his rebel activities again?"_

_"Jack."_

_"Daniel."_

_"Who else would volunteer among them? Who deliberately goes out to make a copy of themselves?"_ Daniel didn't bring up that their wives did just that, he and Jack knew they had motivations that Kalakek didn't.

_"Someone very vain perhaps?" _came the snark, then Jack sobered his transmitted tone, _"He's got an agenda, and we're just helping with it. I guess we'll just have to hope this agenda translates to killing more Goa'uld and not more of us." _Daniel knew Jack meant humans as oppose to literally them, the Re'tu had no reason to eliminate robotic humans as they couldn't be used for hosts.

"You understand?" Harlan asked in awe as Ma'chello went over the process as he walked around the machine that would be used to duplicate Kalakek.

"Hmm? Oh yes, I understand, it is quite complicated, this Hubald was quite a genius," Ma'chello remarked as he continued his examination, "With some study I might be able to reverse engineer his work."

"Com'traya!" Harlan exclaimed with a hope none had seen, nor had he felt, in millennia, "You can help. You can make this...better!"

"Oh yes, I can. I can make this better," Ma'chello was nearly lost in his own thoughts when his symbiote took over, "He will want to make a copy of himself however." The voice gave testament that it was Nfar who spoke, "I think Kalakek would understand why."

"To continue the fight...to make sure every last Goa'uld dies before we do," Kalakek stated simply, and received a grave nod from Ma'chello who returned to the conversation. There was an understanding between these two that transcended their species, a hate of the Goa'uld that united them more than if they were of the same blood.

Billions had given their lives to keep Ma'chello in the fight, and Nfar knew he only accepted him for the blending to stay in the fight. Took Linea's treatment for youth not out of vanity, not out of a desire to live forever because he loved life, but to have one more breath, one more chance to stab at the enemy.

It was why he wanted to make a copy of himself, not to continue to live, but to continue to find ways to fight.

_"He wants to become one of us?" _Sam transmitted to the others in surprise.

_"Makes sense, Sam. If you remember the Update, he kept trying to find ways to prolong his life, this,"_ and Daniel gestured to the machines that made them, _"Let's him keep going for thousands of years to do what he's been so driven to do."_

_"Kill snakeheads," _Jack interjected with complete understanding.

"So this time as we try the process on matter out of phase of our own," Ma'chello announced to the crowd in the chamber, "I believe I understand enough of how this works to adjust it with your help Harlan to duplicate waves exactly 180 degrees out of phase with ours right down to the sub-atomic level."

"And I will be faster and stronger than I am now?" Kalakek asked with an eagerness that worried Jack.

"Why yes...you will be...better!" Harlan exclaimed.

"Why should that matter?" Daniel asked for the rest of them.

"We Re'tu have the advantage of not being seen by your kind and the Goa'uld, however where nature gave us that advantage, we are disadvantaged by not being as strong as your species, the species you had been."

"Still are," Jack quipped dismissing the fact he wasn't human.

"In any case, the previous visits here were to gain an understanding on how this works, and the additions I have made should let it work with transphasic matter," he turned to Narim, "That is why I have been visiting Tollana so often, to gain an understanding and practical working knowledge of phasing matter of which I am very grateful to the Tollan people."

"We are happy to be assistance to our allies the Tok'ra," Narim replied as he continued to try and not steal glances at Sam. Looks that Jacob had picked up on and were not lost on Sam either.

_"You must let her decide for herself,"_ Selmak advised his host, _"Just as you would your biological daughter, Jacob."_

_"He just seems such a pansy,"_ Jacob replied a disapproving look on his face, _"I don't want either Sam with such push over."_

_"Narim is merely quiet and polite. He has a strength he doesn't need to wear on his sleeve I believe is how you would put it. If he has the courage to ask her to join him, then is that not the strength you so desire for a suitor of your daughter?"_ Selmak was proud of the fact that Jacob was even thinking this way about this other Samantha Carter, it showed that form no longer matters to his host.

"As the Tau'ri say, 'okay'," Ma'chello announced, Sam and Daniel having followed him as he went around Harlan's adjusted duplication chamber, "Harlan if you will guide Kalakek over to the scanner I believe the function serves? We shall begin."

"They are going to be at it for a while," Sara remarked indicating Harlan, Ma'chello and Samantha as they monitor Kalakek's duplication," How about a tour?"

Jack perhaps deliberately failed to pick up on his wife's hint to lead the tour, leaving it to Daniel to do so. Showing them the facility, what work Daniel has with translating the Altairian language including hints of an intact city on the surface that they may one day try and find.

He didn't show them the Gateship, by general agreement they felt that should remain their secret. It was a significant tactical advantage and few of them would not put past any of their allies to get rid of the robots to get their ship.

"Dad, everyone, come on we're finished," Sam had said once she caught up with the tour group.

"I can see both of them," Jack pointed out with Sam wincing as she didn't want to have to say what she knew she had to.

"You need to...turn it off sir," she tried to gently remind him.

"Oh," was all Jack said as he and the others switched off the adjustment that let them see transphasic matter and waves. Promptly both Kalakek's disappeared from sight, nor could either be heard. "I guess it works."

"Yes, Colonel O'Neill it does," Narim noted as he also had switched off his device that let him see and hear the Re'tu.

With everyone switched back on, they heard Kalakek talking with...himself, "...so we can now take the risk others kept us from," one was saying to the other, "we can be the one taking the risk, we don't have to stay behind as others act out our plan..."

"That is likely going to go for a while, soooo, what's next?" Jack asked the assembled, which actually stopped the Kalakeks in mid-speech.

"I stay with you, help out with your missions," one of the Kalakeks said, "You intent to continue your fight with the Goa'uld, then I will join you."

"I will go back to my people and continue to...organize," the word coming out of that Kalakek as if bitter and foul tasting, "Our resistance and attack. I understand my people are ready to coordinate with the Tau'ri and Tok'ra." He turned towards Narim, "Will we be working with the Tollan too?"

Narim looked uncomfortable, "No. It is our policy to not fight the Goa'uld as they cannot harm the Tollan people. Just like the Nox we will be neutral towards them."

"Despite how they are decidedly not neutral towards you?" Jack threw in his voice heated.

"Jack."

"Daniel!"

"Jack it's their world, let's respect that," Daniel said vocally switching to transmit internally, _"Let's not antagonize them as they may become allies. Unlike Earth, we might qualify as equals. Especially if the city I'm finding hints about is like the Gateship we found."_

"I'm sorry we cannot be more accommodating," Narim apologized with a slight bow.

"No, no, it's okay. You're here and helping now," Jack hoped that counted towards something diplomatic. Sara gave his hand a pat to show she thought it was a valiant effort...for him.

"It will take time to remove the modifications to make you...better," Harlan was saying to Ma'chello as everyone prepared to depart, "Then you can come back to make us better, com'traya."

Kalakek, the one staying, received the satchels from the original as the two bowed to one another. "I envy the freedom you will have to strike a blow personally against our enemies. Be well Kalakek."

"I honor you for what you'll do for our people. Be well Kalakek," the robotic Re'tu replied in turn.

"Take care dad, and of Selmak too," Sam hugged and pecked a kiss on Jacob's cheek.

"You too, kiddo," he returned her embrace, but left the kiss to her.

"It is good to see you again, Linea," Sha're was saying goodbye to a friend she was glad remained her friend, letting her go, smiling as she joined the others at the event horizon that glowed with its eerie blue light.

It was only after the others had left and the wormhole closed that Kalakek turned to his new companions in arms and asked, "So when do we go on our first mission?"


	5. A Hundred Bytes

A Hundred Bytes

Sam

This has got to be dad's craziest idea to date, but it seems to be going well. Its really weird, and odd working with myself, but collaborating on making a particle accelerator does make sense. 'Twice the Sam's, twice the brainpower' dad said when he came here to convince me. Though I'm still kinda reeling from the fact he thought of asking me to help myself.

Finding out about Jack, the other Jack, stranded on P5C-768, he found out that Martouf was off to find a ship to go get him. Last we heard he did find something eventual, but it's going to take time to get there. Sam came up with the idea of a particle accelerator from what happened with Sokar and the iris, and mentioned to dad that it would take time to design and build. That's when dad contacted me to ask to help, though as I understand it with the new SG-8 and their brainpower, she has some high powered assistance right there.

Still, getting more help is working out. I can work without sleep, and send what I have to the SGC, who in turn will refine it and get to actually building it. Drs. Phillips, Newman and Beckett take turns working in shifts with my 'sister', as dad likes to call her, making this a 24/7 continuous endeavor. It's rather amazing how fast this is going. I can only imagine how it might have gone if Sam had to go it alone. 

I can't believe they didn't think of it, but it seems so simple. Instead of sending someone through to maybe dig who knows how far up through the rock, why not use ground-penetrating radar to find out just how much rock there is and then start blasting. They have the staff weapons, rocket launchers, even Robby, especially Robby, to blow through whatever rock there is. 

Sara

I see the look in his eyes when he hears the news, how conflicted he is inside himself. I can see hope in Jack's eyes as well as loathing. He hates feeling that he might be able to go back to Earth and pick up his life if the other Jack can't come back. He still wants it, be able to see a sunset off the mountain, to go visit his cabin out in the woods, to visit Charlie's grave on the anniversary of his death, Jack feels Harlan stole all of that from him and feels the stirring of an impossible hope with the thought that he could just walk back and pick up that life again. 

And he hates himself for being glad that the other him may not be able to go back to all of that. 

I am glad I am able to help him love the life he now has. He was no where as near depressed as he was when we lost Charlie, and I have no desire to see that Jack come back. I am quite happy with the one I have, which I can more than romantically say, might just be for eternity. 

Jack

For a moment I fool myself into thinking maybe, just maybe I could have my life back. I picture seeing my cabin again, fishing, a sunrise on Earth, the stars from my roof top telescope, Charlie's grave, the Simpsons. The other Jack is gone, well stranded and a good year away from coming back if then. Then reality gives me a kick in the head and I know I'm just fooling myself. Even if that Jack was gone for good, there would be no way that Hammond would welcome me back in his place. No way the NID wouldn't keep trying to find someway to take me and Sara apart, and I wouldn't think of going home without her. 

So I sit here, helping to make this our new home. Two years into infinity and I wonder if it really can be home. I have Sara and I can't thank her, both of them, enough for that. We're going through the gate again and maybe in our own way we can help Earth. It's not really that different than before, sure they don't know what we're doing on their behalf, but for crying out loud most didn't have a clue what was going on under Cheyenne mountain anyway. So the act is the same just a smaller audience to appreciate it. 

It's really just like special ops, except instead of only a rare few in the US of A knowing what we did for our country, no-one back home will know, not even Hammond.

Sometimes we watch Sam work on that particle accelerator thingie and with these new brains Harlan gave us, I suppose we could help, but I'm not ready to be a walking calculator even if I am one. I'll leave the science to the scientist and focus on the new problem of integrating Kalakek as a member of my team.

Odd getting use to him, what he looks like. I don't even think about the fact I shouldn't be able to see him. 

He's smart, like Daniel and Carter, and yet he's cunning like...well if I was being fair, I'd say me, but I'm not fair, so I'll say Maybourne for right now. I know he's capable of doing the same things Maybourne does, no-one sends suicide bombers and not be on the same level as Maybourne. He's also becoming gung-ho, a spas at times. I suppose if I was in a weak body and found myself in a strong one I might be as gonzo to push it as far as I could.

It's just weird, and I wonder if that other O'Neill has to deal with things like this.

Daniel

With the regular updates, Sha're has prompted me to ask about sending my translations to myself and seeing if what 'he' how far he has gotten with the Ancient's language. I am sure I am onto something with the last city on Harlan's planet. I think it's intact even after whatever happen to make his people come down here and copy themselves. 

What I am becoming more and more certain of is that Harlan's people either worked with the Ancients or -were- the Ancients. I wish I could visit Moonbase Alpha, the four races of the Alliance had an outpost there, and I could probably learn even more. Though what Harlan has here is quite a lot and with the kind of brain I have now, I'm learning at an accelerated rate. Yes, I've definitely got to let me know what I've found out.

Except about the city, I have a feeling if they knew about it, they might come and take it. I know I wouldn't be a party to it, and I feel General Hammond would fight such a decision, but I can also see they would see us as 'only' robots. Expendable and not real. Jack is one of us and he feels that way sometimes. 

Hopefully I will be satisfied with what I am sending me.

Sha're

Dan'yel has been happier ever since he followed my suggestion to share what he's learning with his other self. He likes to learn and discover, since they are the same Dan'yel I fell in love with I know they both would be happy with sharing what they know. 

What I find disturbing is how much I keep thinking back to when I helped Jack, the Tau'ri Jack, fight the Stragoth. My desire to help has not diminished but unlike the other me I cannot help heal others with Jan'et. What injuries we sustain only Harlan may heal us from. Using a Ka'kesh'prim'ta on any of us is useless and so I find myself thinking of how I made the Stragoth fly back by the power of the Goa'kesh'sha, the hand of the gods. 

Do I wish to fight by my Dan'yel's side as I did with Ra, like Drey'auc is deciding to do with her Teal'c? I do not think I could use any of the Goa'uld's technology for I am not the same anymore. I look human, but demon technology might not recognize me other than more technology. 

Sara is content to stay behind while Jack and the others go out, and I wonder if I should be too, at least to stay with her and Harlan while the rest go through the Chappa'ai. 

To be here when my Dan'yel returns. 

Teal'c 

Kalakek is a most promising Chal'tii. He wants to learn everything he can, however I will only train him with what he is ready to learn. Adapting the Jaffa fighting style to his, teaching him the basics of Lok'nel proves quite challenging, and a good thing. 

Save for sparring, training with my wife these last two years, challenge has been absent in my life. Indeed this better memory Harlan has given us only allows me time to sit and recall all the atrocities I have committed over the years in the name of false gods. 

I am glad we are going out through the Stargate once more. I cannot atone for what I have done but I can make it better for others. My brother and sister Jaffa who are still out there enslaved by the Goa'uld will one day be free, they must be. O'Neill has shown it is possible, and SG-1 has killed more false gods in these last two years than anyone has in the last two millennia. 

Our people will be free one day. 

Drey'auc

Training along side my husband, learning to fight as one as we are wed as one has been an amazing experience I wonder if the other me has realized. From the update I have learned she sometimes has gone out through the Chappa'ai, which Jaffa women did not normally do, and even gained the respect of one of the Yautja. She bears their mark on her forehead, while I still have the one of Apophis. 

Now my husband and I try to adapt the basics of Lok'nel for Kalakek to learn. It is not just working with someone not Jaffa, as the other me has taught the women of the Stronghold, but adapting the moves of Lok'nel so that it could be used by a Re'tu is a challenge my husband enjoys and I find engaging. 

It is far easier to adapt the use of the Bashaak for Kalakek as he does have only two arms, instead of the four legs that make his learning the movements of Lok'nel...interesting. 

Kalakek 

This body, so strong so fast. When I am not training with the Jaffa I find I want to just run and run down the long lengths of this underground complex. To leap higher than any Re'tu ever has, to move faster and be stronger. I can bend metal in my hands! 

When not running, jumping and testing the extent of my strength I practice. The Jaffa are capable warriors, and their moves are so unlike anything of my people and not just because they are humanoid and we are centauroid, but this method of fighting of moving called 'martial arts'. 

It is an art of war I am eager to learn. 

Much can I do or the cause right now and no longer must I remain behind while others go out to do what I have wished to do, to kill the Goa'uld, to avenge the slaughter they have perpetrated upon my people. 

To drive them from the stars as they have done to us!

Sam

Finally! I've adapted what Victor and Tolok have sent along and updated the latest control protocols with the accelerator. It's amazing that the actual design process took less than a months yet getting the materials and building it stretched the time to three months. After the design checked out, I found I kinda missed the ever four hour exchange of information from Earth. Samuel, Doug, and Tony they known their physics and it was great working with them, and working with me. I can imagine that I found it refreshing to have someone who actually can keep up with me. 

I'll miss working with me.


	6. Shades of Tin

Shades of Shadows

Author's note: Adapted from the beginning of Warrior's People by drakensis, a fanfiction from , and used with permission by the author. Some of the dialogue is directly from there.

If anyone waited to see what came through the recently activated Stargate, at most they'd have seen a ripple. The Gateship flew through under cloak and quickly rose up and away to get an aerial view of the area, or so it would seem.

"Easy honey, you're doing fine," Jack encouraged his wife as Sara O'Neill flew the Gateship. She risked a brief smile and he could see a retort forming on her lips before it left them.

"What no remark about women drivers?"

"And sleep on the metaphorical couch...oh no dear. I'm no Carter or Daniel, but that doesn't make me dumb," Jack flashed a smile as Sara banked the Gateship to give everyone a better view of what lay below them.

"There...what looks like ruins," Daniel pointed out the window in the front, "Let's see about settling down there."

"Easy Danny boy," Jack gestured for Daniel to sit back down, "Don't want to have to tell Sha're that you slipped and feel because someone was standing up while Sara was flying this crate."

"And just what are you implying -Colonel- O'Neill," Sara mock icily asked, with Jack having the good graces to wince and grin at his wife, "You're right honey. Okay Danny boy. Stand up, do jumping jacks, whatever you please. My wife's driving is as steady as...as it needs to be."

"Good save Colonel," Sara threw in at much warmer degrees.

Kalakek chuckled from the back or that is how they translated it. Jack still refused to hear from Sam that it was translation -software-, he knew he was a robot he just didn't like acknowledging it.

"Anyway, it looks like the road we've seen had been Roman..." Daniel was beginning to go on as the Gateship settled down, considering the possibilities of how a transplanted culture from eons after the Goa'uld left Earth could show up in a clearly Goa'uld built area, or ruins of them.

"Sha're did mention meeting Athena, that implies the Goa'uld impersonated that pantheon and that puts some of them remaining on Earth -after- the gate was buried at Giza," few were certain if Daniel was reminding them or talking out loud to himself. Neither were needed with the advanced processors that now served as their minds, but habits of the flesh went on in the synthetic.

"Seems like a retreat of some kind," he suggested minutes later. Despite how long it's been since he 'acquired' this body by Harlan, he still was amazed sometimes by how fast he could think and form conclusions.

"A retreat?" Drey'auc asked, unlike Sha're or Sara, both of whom rotated who stayed with Harlan when they went out to explore, she always went along with her husband.

"Somewhere to rest when they desire privacy. It is rare and such sites are usually secret and well defended. Apophis maintained such a location where he could grow familiar with a new host body," Teal'c volunteered for both his wife and companions.

"Sort of like Jack's cabin?" Daniel asked innocently.

Jack was about to protest but it died on his lips and in fact everyone was still for a moment.

"Sorry, Jack..." Daniel began and stopped as his friend raised a hand to wave the apology off.

"Its gone and belongs to -him-," Jack said the last word with a tinge of bitterness no-one could miss, going to falsely jovial as he spoke again, "We'll campers let's continue on to go boldly where no man, ahem, no one has gone before."

It was hours later when one of Kalakek's eye stalks happened to look up. "Samantha, would you take a look skyward?" he asked with both eye stalks gazing upwards. Sam moved over to where their latest addition to Harlan's growing population of robots who don't look like robots.

She looked up and blinked in surprise. Daniel wasn't the only one still getting use to bodies that were in many ways superior to their originals. "Sir!" she called out in a tone that brought Jack, Teal'c and Drey'auc jogging over to her. She was standing in the middle of a ruined courtyard and looking up into the night sky next to Kalakek.

Their eyes followed her gaze, and Jack was the one to actually speak, "Whoa. It's going to take a while to get use to this..." their eyes on zoom function spotted a ship and satellites in orbit of the planet.

"Not Goa'uld in design," Teal'c needlessly confirmed what their own memory banks concluded, at least since the last update when Sha're joined their number. No-one listed off what they estimated the length of the ship at 385 meters, massing 78,000 metric tons which is when Jack stopped thinking about it. He didn't want to know more in this manner.

"The script on the side of the ship is now familiar," Teal'c said as they all saw it change from whatever language it was before to Goa'uld.

"Coating on the surface of the ship acting as a kind of liquid-crystal display, sir," Sam went on theorizing, "Though why I don't know."

"Samantha the glowing spots in front of the ship, they are not lights for illumination, yes?" understanding Kalakek was not a perfect science yet.

Sam took a look and was amazed at what came to mind, to her mind. The theories that might have taken her days to look up were there in an instant. "It's a kind of drive, of reactionless drive, sir," out of habit reporting her findings to Jack, "You see their creates a number of.." she didn't want to lose her audience, faster thinking does not mean instant understanding of theories, "...nodes in front of the ship, which move very fast in the desired direction," simply saying she conceded but they should understand.

This reminded her how much she enjoyed working with herself...her real...her original self. Having someone able to keep up with her was a nice change.

She went on trying to keep it as simple an explanation as possible, "As the ship is likely magnetically or gravitationally coupled to the nodes, it effectively 'falls' towards them and is dragged along behind."

"It pulls like a horse does a cart or wagon in a western?" Teal'c ventured, it had been a long time since he'd seen any Tau'ri entertainment films or television shows, but of course he and Drey'auc instantly remember what they had seen.

Nodding Sam still wanted to get to the most relevant part, "It also means it's a reactionless drive." She paused unsure anyone really comprehended what she meant, the implications. "It means it doesn't need fuel, no reaction mass."

"Like your Newton's third law?" Kalakek said surprising them all, but he didn't explain how he knew of Newton, much less any of his laws.

However, Sam wasn't going to be derailed by the admission, not when she felt close to explaining what they were seeing up in space, "Yes, that's it Kalakek. 'For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.' Such a drive wouldn't need anything like a rocket or...impulse power," she recalled Jack got Star trek at times, "It could move without an exhaust, motion without having to blast something the other way."

"Let's get Danny in on this..." Jack said deflating Sam who wasn't sure he was ignoring her implications or truly not understanding them.

Jack didn't give any indications one way or the other, just raised his voice only a little to call out to his friend. He didn't like to admit it, but he knew their hearing was far superior to what it had been. If Daniel didn't hear him it wouldn't be due to any problems hearing, he'd likely just be too distracted.

"Daniel!"

"Yes Jack," he said with a distracted sigh not using the radio, nor raising his voice. He accepted they could hear each other despite the distances. Especially when he was engrossed in study and didn't want to bother using a radio or moving to where he knew Jack would prefer to have a conversation, face to face.

"Come out here...we have a puzzle I want your input on," with another sigh Jack clearly heard and -knew- Daniel did because he knew Jack could hear him, they didn't have to breath after all, Daniel made his way to where his friends stood.

"Whoa," he said not realizing he echoed his friend Jack a moment ago as he looked up, "Well by now all of you know the ship's name is Leonidas so what am I here for...?"

Drey'auc was busy in the sand, and Teal'c looked down and inclined his head at his wife who didn't deny her perfect memory or ability to reproduce what she saw on the side of the ship before.

"Hmm...Punjab I'd say closer to Persian...Xerxes," Daniel concluded after going through the references he now could perfectly remember as if he had taken the various books off the shelf back at his...he wouldn't think of it as 'the other one's' office.

"So one moment the ship is named Xerxes, the next Leonidas?" Jack asked more to prompt any comments, which this time none were immediately forthcoming. "Does this make any sense to anyone?" he finally added.

"No it does not O'Neill," Teal'c spoke unintentionally for all of them.

"We could go up, take a closer look," Daniel suggested.

"And what count the rivets? We can see them clearly from here Daniel," Jack snarked.

"I was thinking more of what our ship could tell about theirs its not like we come equi..." Jack cut Daniel off right then, "Don't. You know I don't like to be reminded."

"So we're ignoring we can see it without a telescope..." Daniel teased and let it drop.

"Sara warm up the ship, we're taking off," Jack said over the -radio- deliberately, his wife, however only spoke up what might have been in conversational tones, if not for the ire he could hear in her voice.

"I -just- finished setting up camp..."

They didn't need a fire, they didn't need sleep or to eat, but most of them liked to go through the motions and Sara felt she was contributing by taking care of the 'domestic' chores while everyone else was off playing explorer.

"Look up Sara," Sam said then rattled off a series of numbers that inwardly Sara knew she shouldn't be able to translate to where to look but she did. "Oh...I take it we're going up?"

"Why don't you go help break down camp," Daniel suggested, the 'you' meaning Jack at the very least as he turned to Teal'c and Drey'auc, "I'd like to ask you two to come with me and give me your opinion on what I've found."

"I will help with camp," Kalakek said humorously, it delighted him that they were going through all the motions. Of course, out of them he was the only one who wanted to be what Harlan made him.

"Come on, sir," Sam prompted as she turned to head back to camp along with a reluctant Jack and amused Kalakek. Jack knew Sara wouldn't -stay- annoyed long, and hoped if he delayed his return to camp, whatever cloud over her mood would be gone.

Daniel lead Teal'c and Drey'auc back into the ruins he had been in and to a wall of a kitchen where he now shined needlessly a handheld torch. Habits, he had concluded from a while before, keep up the habits and their sanity for lasting thousands of years might have a better chance at surviving. Though with a smile he figured his went up tremendously when 'they', as he wouldn't think of the originals, let Sha're come to him.

It was his way of not thinking, 'made a copy of', yet at the same time the fact Sha're did think that way showed the depth of her love for him, for either Daniel Jackson.

"Teal'c, Drey'auc, this looks like whoever went after the hieroglyphics in the courtyard didn't care enough to check for the graffiti in the servants' areas. There's no writing of course but someone's done this little set of carvings, looks like they were depicting Jaffa and the helmets of elite guards..."

Teal'c gave the carvings a quick glance. "A serpent guard, a hawk guard and a…" at first it didn't occur to him who the third was, but then part of the perfect recall his new form provided supplied the name he wouldn't have remembered if flesh. Something mentioned by Master Bra'tac, which thinking of never seeing again brought a sadness only Drey'auc picked up on.

"Nekhrun," he said, "The bat helmeted guards are another of the elite and Master Bra'tac had mentioned them in passing, of a false god the other gods did not wish us to remember."

"Three Jaffa serving different Goa'uld is not uncommon in Jaffa jokes however," Drey'auc mentioned only to help bring her husband back a bit from the sadness of a life they can't have any more.

"It looks like the third Jaffa is getting the better of the other two," Daniel pointed out. "That might mean whoever carved this was a servant of the this Nekhrun..." of course it came in a flash, but Daniel still wanted to puzzle it out as if he wasn't a walking computer as Jack would put it.

"Nekhrun's an obscure part of Egyptian mythology," he had pitched his voice so Jack, Sam, Sara and Kalakek could also hear, "A god of darkness. The few references that have been found suggest that he rebelled against Ra and later that Ra tried to excise him from history. If I recall correctly he was the god of bats too and had the ears and wings of a bat."

"Could that be who is up there, Daniel Jackson?" Teal'c asked on their way to the Gateship.

"I wouldn't think so Teal'c. Goa'uld, even exiled ones, tend to keep with what works for them," he mused as they walked up the ramp and took their seats, everyone listening to him as the theorized out loud, "We've seen from Sokar, another banished Goa'uld, still uses Ha'taks and Sha're reported that Anubis, another exile, also still uses Goa'uld technology as we understand it."

He paused a moment to silently thank Ma'chello who came up with a way to selectively access memories. Sha're, the original, only had snatches of memories of her time as Amonet. His Sha're remembered everything. At least they were able to find her son and say goodbye. Oma will protect him and really he shouldn't have a pair of robots raise him.

Daniel would have loved to let the originals know about their son, but it was agreed, Earth can't know they're out here. They'd misunderstand and certainly their Jack O'Neill would lead the way...sadly Daniel knew -theirs- would.

"So someone well advance enough tech to make it to space, perhaps overthrew Nekhrun and hides from surrounding Goa'uld by pretending he was still around?" Sam threw out the one theory that everyone agreed sounded plausible.

"Is this reactionless drive able to be used to travel to other stars?" Kalakek wanted to know and that question brought Sam up short.

"I don't know Kalakek. I mean it could, but you're talking a journey that would be measured in years. Something like that," she gestured at the ship they were flying towards, "might go as high as eighty or more percent the speed of light."

"Wanna take over from here flyboy?" Sara teased her husband a little while later when they had gathered in the Gateship and flew up to orbit, it was a serious suggestion, however. She wasn't a pilot, Jack is and while playing flying chauffeur was one thing, when it came up to possibly needing 'fancy flying' she'd leave it to her hubby.

Jack smiled at her, took the controls and started to pan around the decidedly non-Goa'uld appearing space craft. Sara exchanged seats with Sam who started to study what readings she could make out. Daniel, even with a faster brain, still was working out deciphering what the consoles controlled or could display.

"92 life forms...two are not human..." Sam reported as Jack flew the Gateship on a lazy orbit around the larger vessel, "...fusion reactor..." Jack had to smile at the excitement creeping into Sam's voice. That was definitely something Earth hadn't developed and even though they lived on Harlan's world of wonders, it was still exciting to see a technology that could benefit Earth.

"I am reading Jaffa onboard, but if I'm reading this right, they're in the minority. I can't confirm if any of the life forms are a Goa'uld or not. I can't get that precise yet," Sam apologized and Sara felt she say something to make her feel better, maybe get her to explain something. That tended to work.

"But you can tell Jaffa from human?" she asked and saw her ploy work as Sam went into lecture mode about temperatures of humans and Jaffa, how regulated the latter is because of their symbiote. "...which of course means that one of the readings I'm labeling 'Jaffa' could be Goa'uld," she concluded and looked satisfied as she came to her conclusion.

"Hey I think I've picked up their radio traffic..." Sam announced and her hands blurred across the crystal controls, "Daniel, could you type in Punjab and Persian?" A request that would have been insane to the originals, but this Daniel could comply and it was not long before the two of them had come up with a translation program and decryption algorithm to listen in on the communications traffic.

"...attack shortly before dawn on a small armory. Representatives from the Umbra have identified the world of the invaders..." news that wasn't greeted with joy in the Gateship, when the news went on to say the raid was conducted by the Tau'ri.

Earth.

"Think we've happened on a raid by the SGC?" Daniel suggested while Sam was busy at her console.

"Captain?" Jack prodded as he noticed that look that Sam gets when she's onto something.

"I think I can hack into their computer network. The ship's pretty sophisticated, but the Angrezins not that much, sir."

"Angrezins?" Jack asks in a tone requesting more information that was just presented.

"The people of this planet," Daniel jumped in, "I think Sam is saying that this planet is called Angrezi."

In short order, that both the visiting ship, and the people of Angrezi would find unnerving Sam hacked their databases and found out quite a bit of information that she and Daniel relayed to the others as they continued to orbit the ship that is not only part of fleet of ships but are part of a interstellar alliance that is actively hiding from the System Lords.

"Hiding?" came the incredulous utterance from one unbelieving Jack O'Neill. Daniel decided to tend to the doubting Thomas among them.

"Jack, if these records are right, this Nekhrun lead abandoned humans off of worlds that were once under the System Lords and has let them develop and grow like we, like Earth has, in the thousands of years they have been forgotten by the System Lords. This is where we could have been if one Goa'uld stayed behind and helped guide us out of the Stone Age."

"Daniel for his own good," Jack countered, "Snakeheads don't do anything for anyone except themselves."

"Except the Tok'ra," Sam muttered her interjection.

"Hey, I'm still not sure about them...though they did get SG-6 back to the SGC, so I'm more for them than against."

Back and forth they went, as without noticing the fact they didn't need to eat, drink or sleep, they didn't think about it. "...okay, let's say this Snakehead is a rebel and after looking after his pet humans. This just means we don't blow him up right now. What should we do campers? We can't make first contact for Earth because we in no way can represent Earth. I'm hearing we shouldn't take out their Goa'uld overlord...so..."

"So..." Daniel began and paused, then seems to collect his thoughts, "...Jack..."

"Daniel?"

"We contact the Tok'ra and see if they want to make an alliance, and/or introduce them to Earth."

Jack wasn't clearly happy of letting either kind of symbiote decide the fate of apparently multiple human worlds. However he didn't have a better idea and since he was convinced they weren't slaves, started to take the ship back down to the planet to dial up the gate and start their round about way home when Sam spoke up with a tone of urgency.

"Sir! I think I've been spotted...traced!" she was as disbelieving at the feat as Jack had been with the notion of a helpful 'snakehead'.

"Something's happening out there Colonel," she added as space to the right and left of the Gateship started to shimmer, and they heard Jack say, "We've got two ships decloaking!"

Looking at the effect, it really did seem similar to what they saw on Star trek, however it was no Romulan or Klingon vessel of fiction out there but two enormous...things that one could only call vessels because they were encountered out in orbit.

They were both light drinking black and resembled twin spiders, flattened and joined at their bodies, the top larger than the bottom. Ten spines or legs like said spider splaying out in front and to the side of them, or that was the impression the objects gave.

As they estimated dimensions of the Xerxes-Leonidas so they were doing with the two nightmares that hung out flanking the tiny craft. Tiny since these two behemoths were two kilometers wide, but due to the unidentifiable material they were made out of no mass estimate computed within their minds.

"From their facing I take it they can -see- us, Carter?" Jack ventured with Sam nodding absently.

"Maybe we should try to leave?" Sara volunteered, though with a tone of a very deferential suggestion, she wanted to leave it to the professionals.

"Best advice all day honey," Jack took the handles into his hands and was in the process of turning towards the planet when he heard Sam's 'Incoming!' from just next to him.

Everything rocked, and part of a panel in front of Sam sparked as well as a panel in the back of the Gateship. "We're visible! It wasn't a direct hit just something they shot into our area."

"Getting a surrender request sir," Sam added to the rest of the less-than-stellar-news she was reporting.

Jack pulled up on the crystal sticks and moved them towards the Xerxes-Leonidas, "At least them we know."

"A case of the David you know, O'Neill?" Teal'c asked and silently everyone knew he deliberately said the saying wrong. It made them all feel better as Jack replied, "The devil Teal'c, the devil you know."

Guided 'below' the ship and then up into a bay, Jack expertly moved the Gateship and then landed it on a deck that felt as if it had gravity, impressing Sam. Looking across from them they could see a kind of craft that might have been made by the modern military back home, yet felt advanced.

Sam knew she shouldn't be surprised at how much she was comprehending just from visually looking at the vehicles and equipment around them, "I'd say that is a kind of dropship sir...vector thrust maybe...definitely VTOL capable...the wheeled vehicle could be a kind of tank, notice the turret at the back that runs along a track or a kind of APC..." it would be something that the original Sam Carter could get to estimating just not as quick as she knew she was doing. Not with the certainty she felt and knew that Jack agreed with her.

The men and women marching out to from a now open bulkhead reminded them of the guards back home in the gateroom, there to 'greet' visitors. However while there was a certain feel of weaponry similar to what was carried by soldiers back home, the actual configuration differed.

"Bullets...slug throwers sir," Sam reported to Jack but really was for the benefit of the rest in the ship. They saw the soldier were wearing BDUs like back home but over them were armored pieces of the kind Jack and Sam knew were being funded for testing but no where near fielding. "Notice two are carrying a kind of machine gun, actually worn by the soldier using a sophisticated harness mechanism, sir."

"Sweet..." then Jack remembered, perhaps not actually forgetting, just seeming to be distracted, that the soldiers and aforementioned hardware was there because of them.

"Well team, let's go meet the munchkins," Jack stood up first and lead the way to the back, a slapped panel started the ramp lowering.

"They are in fact quite tall, O'Neill," Teal'c corrected as he followed along with Drey'auc who chose to flank Sara to assure her. Yes their bodies were likely superior to those out there, but in their minds they still thought of themselves as more vulnerable than they are. Kalakek followed last though in truth they had to get past him to go out the door.

Jack was hoping to have an advantage with Kalakek, as a Re'tu, even a robotic one, made up of waves that are exactly 180 degrees out of phase with what humanity, and he supposed even this branch of it, right down to the sub-atomic level, they wouldn't see or hear their latest addition. Jack did understand what Sam said most of the time, he just couldn't let on he did.

He -does- have a reputation to uphold after all.

One soldier walked in and his poise screamed 'officer' to Jack and Sam, instead of the BDUs and armor the others wore, he was outfitted with cream slacks, a beret and an Ike jacket.

"I'd say welcome to Angrezi," the man said dryly, "But I'm afraid that the Angrezi aren't feeling too welcoming at the moment ... something about a little raid to grab our weapons. Weapons we were giving the Angrezi as part of their joining our alliance."

"But you're not Angrezi?" Daniel ventured from a quick assessment, the man slowly shook his head.

"However the soldiers you assaulted were members of the Padishah of Angrezi's army," the man explained, "The property stolen is where we come in more than just support of our new allies. It was ours and we'd like it returned."

"And you are called..." Jack prompted in a tone familiar to all of his team save Kalakek.

"How terribly remiss of me. You are aboard the Confederacy of Free Systems ratha Leonidas and I have the privilege of being Jemadar von Pinn of the 33rd Heinessen Pada Regiment."

_"Jemadar? Like from your Star Trek?"_ Teal'c sent to the rest and Drey'auc smiled, she appreciated her husband sense of humor deliberately misunderstanding the Tau'ri at times.

_"Jem'Hadar," _Daniel sent back and somehow sounded exasperated, yet amused, over their link, _"They're called the Jem'Hadar, von Pinn is a Jemadar,"_ though Daniel when reciting cultural information, even over this link, the excitement was unmistaken able, _"On Earth that was the lowest rank of commissioned officer, equivalent to a lieutenant, in the British Indian Army and Indian Army until 1965."_

_"In fact, 'Ratha' is the Indo-Iranian term for the spoked-wheel chariot of Antiquity. I suppose they call what we would label a ship, a chariot."_

_"Makes sense, kind of silly to expect everyone to call something that moves through space a ship. I mean, it isn't exactly the sea,"_ Sara sent contributing to the conversation, _"Especially as Sam says their drive pulls them along like a horse would a chariot."_

_"Indeed,"_ Teal'c seem to sum up the subject in his one word manner.

"The 'Confederacy of Free Systems'?" Sam asked curiously. "Who are you free of?"

"Why, the Goa'uld," von Pinn replied in surprise. "Surely you have encountered the self-important popinjays in your explorations?"

"You were once enslaved by the False Gods?" Teal'c asked.

Von Pinn shook his head. "Fortunately not. The Confederacy is sworn never to submit to their tyranny." He gestured for them to follow him out of the cellblock. "Please, follow me. The Risaldar is attending to a small matter of diplomacy and has invited you to join him for a light meal in a few moments."

He turned, stopped and said in their direction, "This way please."

_"At least they are civil, that's a good sign Jack,"_ Daniel sent as they casually followed von Pinn.

_"They also do not appear to see me,"_ Kalakek threw in more to contribute than sooth any real concern. Few could perceive the Re'tu and humanity certainly weren't among the short list of those who can without some kind of obvious technology to do so.

_"I shall continue to follow in the rear of your guards,"_ he added with an undertone of mirth. Having stressed -your- guards meaning they were marching behind the others and not aware of him. It did seem as if Kalakek was having too much fun with not being seen than a Re'tu had any right to be.

Not that any of them were conversant with Re'tu civilization much less society or in particular this one Re'tu rebel and recently ex-terrorist.

They were walking down a long and possibly central corridor at least that was Sam's estimate. Hatches came up at intervals and some of them were even open. What might be just a glance, a glimpse for a normal human, they took in quite a bit and could review it perfectly along the trek to this important personage.

"_So what do you make of them?"_ Jack enquired.

"_Well they're almost certainly not backed by the Goa'uld," _Daniel said. _"No Goa'uld, not even the Tok'ra, would use this much technology, they use the bare minimum to get the job done and the rest is as low-tech as possible to keep their slaves from learning too much."_

"_But they're human, right?"_

"_It seems like it. The Angrezi sounded like they might have originated from the Indian subcontinent. Von Pinn sounds Germanic, but judging by his accent he's more accustomed to something like Hindi as well. Punjabi possibly."_

"_So they've got more than one culture then?"_

"_Yes. It's possible that they come from several worlds that were colonized by Goa'uld and later abandoned."_

"_But didn't he say that they had never been enslaved by the Goa'uld?"_ Sam asked. _"I mean, they had to come from Earth originally, so who else could have brought them out here?"_

Pinn led to them next room and the door slid open to reveal a large room, furnished comfortably. Von Pinn then gestured to a bearded man who was wearing the same uniform as the jemadar, but with a braid on his jacket epaulettes and he wasn't alone.

There were two others flanking this bearded man, arachnidlike in appearance, in fact somewhat like a Re'tu. Nor was the appearance the only thing similar, each of them could tell that these two were like Kalakek and not visible to human senses.

Sam noted each one are similiar to Kalakek in that they are an insect-like organism, however they differed with a spiky, violet-black carapace. Daniel's observations were that they are similar in shape to a praying mantis with an upper body, shoulder spines, a mobile head and at least one pair of grasping forelimbs. The rear of the body is supported by multiple pairs of legs.

Inwardly he smiled at the details he comprehended in just these first several seconds of sighting.

He counted fourteen eyes in total divided into four groups. Two sets of three arranged, slanted upward and two sets of four arranged to align perfectly under the first sets. So many details in fewer than ten seconds.

One detail none of them missed, the bearded man's eyes began to glow with that familiar golden light.

Instinct or reflex, there was an urge to raise weapons they didn't carry and yet even as all of that processed so too did the fact that the guards behind them -did- carry weapons. To those guards they only appeared to flinch at most.

"I thought you said that this Confederacy of yours had nothing to do with the Goa'uld," Jack hissed to von Pinn.

"I said that we weren't enslaved by the Goa'uld," the jemadar replied with a roll of his eyes. "I didn't say we had never had contact with them. He led our ancestors to these worlds eons ago and has worked alongside us to make the Confederacy a reality. Risaldar Ayodhya was honored to carry him to Angrezi for the ceremonies to admit them to the Confederacy."

"How kind of you to say so," the Risaldar said, brushing down his jacket as he stood up. "Please," he said to SG-1, "seat yourselves. I've ordered a light meal be prepared."

"So," he said, eyeing them as they all gingerly took seats facing his. "You are the famous SG-1 whose exploits have become legend anywhere one can tap into the gossip of the System Lords. Three of the long forgotten Tau'ri, and of course the quite infamous Shol'va Teal'c, once the First Prime to Apophis. I am honored to meet you."

His eyes seem to widen as enough guards had flowed into the room to let Kalakek walk in and finally saw the two life forms like himself. "Shades!"

They were the last words Jack or the others seem to understand even with their translation programs. Kalakek and these...Shades spoke in what sounded like high pitched clicks or whistles, twisted and digitized at least to their ears. What perhaps surprised them more was that this Risaldar seem to both see and follow the conversation while von Pinn or the guards did not appear to follow either.

He gestured with his arms, "Let us move to the other side of the room, and not crowd them."

"-They- are here, Risaldar?" von Pinn asked with a hint of awe.

"Yes, they not only got us here they are aboard with me," Ayodhya answered and turned to Jack, "So, why may I ask did the Tau'ri feel they had to come and raid my future allies?"

It didn't take long to convince the Risaldar as apparently Jack's, the 'other' one, has quite the reputation as a man who could be trusted. However there was a...complication.

"...And I assure you I do take your word," Ayodhya pointed out, "but even if I take your word for this, which the Angrezi may not, there's no actual proof. And I'm not about to screw up the negotiations with the Padishah, who takes attacks on his soldiers rather personally, by letting the closest thing he has to culprits just walk away."

_"We have no way of knowing if this is SGC sanctioned or not Jack,"_ Daniel sent, concerned that the Stargate Command might actually be involved.

"I have a suggestion," Kalakek interrupted as the three of them moved over to their side of the room, "Since we cannot go to the SGC directly, none of us having a code for the Iris. Why not go to Moonbase Alpha and from there make contact and find out what is going on?"

"I can't just let you waltz out of here," Ayodhya began and was silenced by more whistles, buzzes and high pitched whines, "Oh. I suppose that would work."

"And, well, what?" Jack prompted not happy about being excluded from a conversation that may decide their fate.

"Well, Kalakek goes to this Moonbase Alpha while the rest of you stay here," the Risaldar said looking inordinately pleased about the whole arrangement.

And he was pleased showing them the delights, a demonstration of the military prowess of the Confederation he guides, not rules, guides, all the while Jack and the others were painfully aware they had a deadline to meet, one of life and death.

Kalakek had it as well and did not see himself expendable despite his being robotic and like the others, with his original still about. Surprised with the Re'tu establishing a presence on the Tau'ri moon, he was more interested in getting back, specifically getting back to Harlan's world before their power sources run out and they die.

"...so apparently this rogue NID faction was stealing from a remote location and passing on their findings to a mole in the SGC," Ayodhya was explaining to his people as they gathered at the gate on the planet below.

"But what about my men, restitution for their deaths!" the Padishah called out, still looking around for the Tau'ri he heard were in the Risaldar's custody. They were waiting in a cloaked Gateship. Inside Jack was making a hurry up gesture. They weren't at the end yet, but they could feel the twinges of weakening power.

"So tell me again why we're waiting?" he asked no-one in particular.

"Because Earth could use this alliance and so we go when the Risaldar says we can, sir," Sam thought she better explain, Sara could do so but it might pick a fight in Jack's mood and Daniel had gone through the explanation last time. It would be Teal'c's turn next time.

"We can come back or send the other SG-1 to negotiate with them, but only if we don't appear as if we are running out on them on bad terms, sir." It made sense to Jack this time as well as the others, but as much as he didn't like his robotic nature, he wasn't ready to die, nor was he ready to see Sara or his friends die. Not when they could just leave, these Shades, or as they are called back at the SGC, Shadows, are way up in orbit. Their ships at least, and so no-one could stop them from dialing the gate and going.

To sit around and just listen to speeches..."Jack?"

"Daniel?"

"He's finishing up. We can go out now," Daniel said getting up, along with Teal'c and Sam. Sara, Drey'auc and Kalakek would stay in the Gateship, and take it through. Daniel pointed out they should be seen by everyone who might be part of getting the alliance so if it is SG-1 who comes back, it is established what they look like.

Coming around a tree, they didn't pay attention to the Gateship as it rose under cloak. Whoever made the Gateship likely used the same principle of cloaking the Goa'uld Nirrti discovered and earlier this year as they learned from the update.

Sara held the ship steady and hoped the boys and Sam were quick to get out of the way once they go through. She smiled as she thought of the jokes of 'woman driver' Jack would make if she cuts it too close to their exit on the other side to fly through.

Watching them go through the gate, Sara thought the jokes might just be worth it to see the look on Jack's face...she knew they were fast enough to dodge out of the way nearly automatically. She shared a look with Drey'auc and confirmed that her Jaffa friend had a similar thought. With that impish impulse still on her mind she flew the Gateship through the gate perhaps a second earlier than she should.

The look was worth it.

Author's notes: Changes from drakensis story were first which SG-1, this one had Jaffa in Nekhrun's service, his did not, also the timing, his excellent story had it when the NID were operating the second gate, I placed this about the time of the episode 'Shade of Grey.' Other changes were he had a cross over with star wars amog other things, the ships and equipment I'm using are from the Colonial Marines of the Alien movie series, specifically the second movie, Aliens. The reactionless drive is from a website called Orion's arm, though the theory is actually one NASA had explored/suggested for the future. Finally I went with ranks and titles more Indian than in the original story just to add a touch of multiculturalism and be a bit different. His story goes beyond this point and I intend to revisit it in one of the series I am I writing. My thanks to drakensis again, do go read his story.


	7. Maternal Input

Maternal Input

Author's note: After the adventure of last chapter, this might seem a bit calm as its a goodbye of sorts with the robotic Sha're and the son of the original Sha're.

Sha're

I hold my son in my arms and while I know I did not give him birth, I still remember doing so. Oma Desla came through the gate telling us she had just seen the other Dan'yel and myself. They had come to the conclusion my Dan'yel and I had already. We could not protect my son even in secret.

Apart of me knows by just holding my son how much he has grown, how heavy he is, measurements in cubits and debens as well as Dan'yel's meter and grams or Jack's feet and ounces. It is a part that is from Harlan that I do not think much about merely note as I hold my son close to a heart that exists only in my mnd.

I hear his heartbeat, measure his breath and do not take it past the point where I am aware of them as events, not facts that Jan'et would measure with precision.

These are memories I will cherish and know I can relieve them over and over again. Like Saman'tha does rearding Narim's feelings for her. It is not something she has shared with the others, but I had been concerned that after my arrival she would feel so alone as the one without a mate.

Sara and Drey'auc had come to the same conclusion and we talked with Saman'tha when the men were away. It was not easy at first, she did not want to think about it, or face that particular fact. This was something I had to draw out of her, slowly, patiently.

It was worth it if only to help her come to terms and perhaps seek a solution. One the other Saman'tha may not see in front of her. I hope both Saman'tha's do find happiness of the right someone in their lives. The joy I have with my Dan'yel, the love I see shared with Jack and Sara, Teal'c and Drey'auc is something I wish Saman'tha will experience.

She can that, sadly she cannot experience what Sara, Drey'auc and I have as mothers. With me having the least time with my baby.

Yet I seem to know when he is becoming upset, and why. I do not think pattern recognition, that is something Saman'tha would tell me. I think he is hungry and begin to panic. I do not know if even my original self could have fed him. She would have, I would have, if the demon had not desecrated our body.

"Here, drink this," Harlan tells me and I do so without question. Soon I feel a heaviness that can only mean one thing as to where I feel it. Inwardly I know the precise measurement of what I have to give my son to the des. Dan'yel would compare a des to an ounce, things I do not try to think about, but turn to Harlan with the question on my face and as I see on my Dan'yel's.

"I have made you better!" Harlan says as if that would be an explanation enough.

"Robots that lactate? For crying out loud, who would think of that?" I hear Jack scoff, but indeed that is what I feel has happened. I know happen as the liquid Harlan gave me triggered what Dan'yel would call a factory within me, an energy-to-mat-ter re-pli-ca-tion process that makes the milk my baby needs.

"Parents were dying first, babies had needs," Harlan went on in a tone I recognized as his thinking what he said should be obvious.

"Have your people ever heard of bottle feed?" Jack continued to quietly, as to not disturb my son, berate Harlan and his people.

"Babies did not react as well, proven fact. If a future we wanted, needed children to grow right," Harlan defended, he was always defending when talking with Jack.

I knew the precise moment I was ready and worked off what clothing was in the way. Jack turned away, turning Harlan around with him. "T," he insisted and Teal'c turned around to as my Dan'yel sent to me.

_"It is a taboo among some cultures on my world for a man to look upon a woman breastfeeding her child, Sha're." _

_"Then why are you still looking my husband?"_ I think he caught the tease in my send without talking.

_"I like to think of him as our son, and this will likely be the only time I get to see the two of you like this,"_ Dan'yel replied with a shy, but warm smile upon his lips.

Feeling my son nurse off me for the first time is indescribable and in the wonderous feeling of giving to him, a question comes to my mind that I send to my Dan'yel, not asking Oma for I fear the answer,_ "Do you think my other self was able to feed him at least once before she had to let him go?"_

Dan'yel's sad look answered me before his send of a reply, _"Unlikely Sha're. I don't even know if you, the other you, lactated and if she did it would have been over by the time she caught up to him on Kheb months later." _

I feel sorry for my other self right then, knowing she will never know this feeling. Soon my son is content and sleepy and so I begin to rock my son and sing a song, a lullaby in the language of my people.

Drey'auc

Watching Sh'are I think to Teal'c and my's decision not to have a copy of Ry'ac made. It was the right choice to make, as he would not wish to remain a boy for all eternity. Still there is that part of me that wishes I could have him as my baby for ever. To hold and care for him, to keep him from all harm. To have him near me.

Perhaps Oma Desla senses this, perhaps Sha're did as well, for she smiles after handing her baby over to Oma who in turn hands her to me to let me hold the child so many search for, the child my other self helped deliver.

Humans and Jaffa did not mingle often, when we did it was they as our servants or victims in the case of some other Goa'uld's humans. Jaffa women did not see that side of it often, yet we heard tales from our returning husbands of course.

Tales I wish my perfect memory would not recall as I hold this little one. Tales that let me know how this child will be so fortunate unlike many other human children. He will not live in the same kind of fear, he will live to be a man one day, as my Ry'ac will be a warrior one day.

So many children have been killed by the false gods. Some on a whim, some for their ceremonies, some as an enemy would send their Jaffa to wipe out all their enemies including the human slaves, a few to punish or remind the humans their place.

It is why I know the Goa'uld must die. For the freedom of my people, and the children of the humans.

However unlike the Tau'ri whose children do not know what their kin experience under the false gods, this child of Sha're's will. He will have the full memory of the Goa'uld including what they have done, the evils they have wrought.

Looking into a face so innocent, I hope he does not come into his knowledge so soon. Let him remain a child ignorant of such for as long as possible.

Sara

He's handed to me next, though I know I didn't ask, but I really did wish to hold Sha're's son. Holding him brings back so many memories. Ones I can clearly access instead of vaguely in some instances. A few I don't need to be a product of Harlan's science to remember clearly holding my Charlie. Nor his first steps, his teeth coming in, his first words.

Holding Sha're's son let's me realize I can relive so perfectly holding my little boy when he was alive. Watch him grow until that day I wish I could forgot and know I never will.

I didn't know we could cry, yet I feel the tears on my cheek that tells me I can. I also feel Sha're and Drey'auc's hands on my shoulders as they must know what I'm going through. Not a word had been spoken, I suppose since they know what happened to Charlie and they know how perfect our memories are, realizing what is causing me to cry really doesn't take a genuis like Sam.

Handing him back to his mother, I feel Jack there behind him, taking me into the circle of his arms. I suppose he didn't have to be a genius to know what was going on in my head any more than my friends. My Jack, I love him so and glad that I have him back, I just wish I could also have Charlie.

Sha're

One final time I hold my son. I take in his smile as he slowly wakes, his little laugh, his smell, how soft his skin is and know this will be likely the last time I see him as a child. I'm happy to know he will grow up safe and that means this is not really a goodbye. Not even as I hand him to Oma Desla do I really think of this as a final farewell. I do wave, both Dan'yel and I do. My son cannot know what it means, and Oma must know we are not waving at her as she empowers the Chappa'ai to take my son away.

Live my son. Be safe. Be free. We love you always.


	8. Haywired

Haywired

I really like Tau'ri music. My form allows me to recall it so perfectly it is like it plays in my mind. It is so good to have what O'Neill would call a 'soundtrack' to play as I work. Though in truth, one could say this is play and not work. I would use another Tau'ri phrase, combining business with pleasure.

Another enemy down, and another, another, the terror is gratifying to see as my eyestalks take in the Jaffa as they try to find the source of their death. Some run, most stand and fight, all of them die.

It is good to be their death. A misquote I know, but one I feel appropriate to what I am to them.

I particularly love the wild firing as they try to shoot what is firing at them, killing them.

_Another one bites the dust_

_Another one bites the dust_

_And another one gone, and another one gone_

_Another one bites the dust_

_Hey, Im gonna get you too_

_Another one bites the dust_

Ah, Tau'ri music. Sometimes it can be quite...appropriate.

_"Jack?"_

_"Daniel?"_

_"Well, I take it Kalakek is sufficiently terrorizing the Jaffa while we wait for said Goa'uld to poke his head out in the inevitable escape route he has?"_

_"Well Daniel Kalakek is a -terrorist-, so that is what he knows what to do," _Jack sent back as they transmitted to each other from their various positions.

Sara piloted the Gateship, while Teal'c, Drey'auc and Sam spread out to cover likely escape routes of the Goa'uld in question once Kalakek flushed him out into the open.

_"Which snakehead is this one, again?"_ Jack asked over their tacnet knowing perfectly well which one and knew they knew he knew, taking a look around he added, _"Different sort of pyramids here."_

_"Something Central or South American?"_ Sara asked to talk to someone. While technically everyone was alone and in position, she felt the most isolated in the Gateship since she wasn't suppose to actually do something other than play getaway driver.

_"Aztec,"_ Daniel filled in absently for the audience, _"Acolmiztli specifically, a god of the underworld."_

_"Hence why he's mostly underground?"_ Jack ventured as he watched more Jaffa rush into the entrance he covered, _"More Jaffa pouring in. Our boy Kalakek is drawing the crowds. I don't think we're going to have many Jaffa out here soon. T you ready?"_

_"I am O'Neill,"_ Teal'c replied looking across the field at what he knew as several Udajeet and his Tau'ri friends would call Death Gliders.

_"You sure Kalakek knows to -just- smoke our snakehead out? He's not going to try and take him on?" _

_"He might, the Re'tu have more reason to hate the Goa'uld than we do. The Goa'uld nearly wiped them out," _Daniel reminded Jack, and was about to launch into further elaborations when he saw movement at the entrance he covered, "Jaffa are no longer running in, they are running out of the pyramid."

_"Same here sir," _Sam chimed in.

_"I also see them running out, O'Neill,"_ Drey'auc reported from her position, _"They appear to be not just running, but fleeing."_

_"I'd say abject terror sir,"_ Sam agreed.

_"Yeah, I'd say they were running for their lives. Notice how some are even disguarding staff weapons as they run, one or two Zats as well,"_ Daniel noted on the channel what they plainly could see at each of their hidden positions.

_"The invisible terror, sounds like a monster movie doesn't it?"_ Sara threw out for general comment.

_"Ah, here our boy comes,"_ Jack sent eagerly getting his M24 ready, he didn't mind how fast he could ...think, no compute, never compute, range and the windage, _"He's looking burned. I think our boy Kalakek tried to get him."_

Despite the fact he didn't need to breath, Jack did and gently pulled the trigger once he had the shot. Acolmiztli's head disappeared in a mist that splattered his personal Jaffa guard.

"Regenerate that snake head," Jack muttered to himself not transmitting over the net, though he did a moment later, _"Target's down."_

At each location, Daniel, Drey'auc and Sam started to put away their M24s. It had taken Jack a while to teach them snipering, but it wasn't as if they didn't have the time to spend. No-one pointed out how quickly they picked things up, what took weeks and months back at Camp Robinson Arkansas, took days and weeks with how their new selves picked up things.

It helped that they could remain perfectly still for quite a lot longer than a human being could, not that they had to with Kalakek's modification of what was becoming standard operating plan of action. Jack noted, with the rise of one death glider, that Teal'c is making his run on the rest of the grounded gliders. His part of the plan included hitting the depots where Carter's demolitions should help pack the punch to raze them.

Right now they were five for five minor Goa'ulds. The Tok'ra had a standing request to ask first before trying to take out a major Goa'uld and especially a system lord if only to prevent any losses on their side or power shifts to a System Lord that would increase their threat instead of diminish it.

_"He's giving chase,"_ Daniel sent to the rest o them, _"Should we call him off?"_

_"Nah, Danny boy, let him have his fun."_

They watched as one lone Re'tu gave chase after the fleeing Jaffa, one-by-one shooting them as he went along. With their symbiotes now unable to sense a Re'tu, especially a robotic one, they had no idea what was killing them.

A few veterans of the Re'tu holocaust did have some inkling of what this could be, but once identified they lasted the lest amount of time as Kalakek made sure -they- died.

_And another one gone, and another one gone_

_Another one bites the dust_

I really like this refrain, I think it says it all. Ah, another Jaffa trying to double back, but since he can't see me he doesn't know what he's doubling back around. Now he doesn't have to wonder at all.

_Hey, Im gonna get you too_

_Another one bites the dust_

I'm running out of Jaffa!

Author's notes: as if it needed to be said, lyrics by Queen.


End file.
